The Red Half of an Apple
by MateriaFlower1-1
Summary: I was supposed to be her guardian, but I knew less than she did. In this world, the swirling spiral of endless death that they named Spira, I was just the newest Dream of the bunch - and I would be their deadliest. I was the one that she loved, the one that was supposed to make her happy… Some guardian I was. A series of Tuna Oneshots for your reading pleasure.
1. 017 Left Behind

**_Disclaimer: I don't own Final Fantasy X_**

 _Hello everybody! This is my newest oneshot series, 'Twin Eyes and Guardians'. It's just a series of unrelated (unless explicitly said otherwise/extremely heavily implied) one shots that you can dip in and out of - skip the ones you don't like the look of, read them all, only read the first and last: whatever suits you!_

 _I'll be posting every Sunday (I know I'm slightly late today - teething issues, sorry!) But I really do hope that you'll join me on this adventure._

 _Enjoy!_

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 _017\. Left Behind_

I felt so stranded, like one half of an apple cleft in two.

He was gone. It was like my other half was missing.

It seems so silly that I placed so much value on him during my pilgrimage. I'd never known him - never even _seen_ him - before the day I set out from Besaid, and yet just a while later I made him one of the people I'd trust with my life. And, with the death that was quickly approaching. Perhaps I was just asking for trouble. What was a young girl like me to do when she a handsome young man befriended her, anyway?

I can remember it like yesterday. I'd come out of the cloister, so tired from winning my first summon; I was all sweaty and dishevelled - that I'm sure of. And yet, here was this man I'd never known, willing to catch me as I fell. I remember thinking he looked quite beautiful, and how much like a man from my dreams he looked like. And the voice of the faith sounded strong in my mind still, 'Take care in who you surround yourself with. Joy may strike, once and twice, and sorrow will follow. But life will always prevail.' I remember thinking at that time that perhaps this was the joy the Fayth spoke of. I think I was right. Even though I walked closer to the end with every step, for a while, I couldn't have been happier.

He was a man from another world, another time period entirely. Another universe, it seemed. His inflection was slightly different to those who surrounded me in Spira. He wore different clothes and even described the food that he ate as 'different in every way'. Perhaps I was drawn to him because of that - the mystery and intrigue he brought with him. Perhaps, in turn, that's why he was drawn to me.

He helped me through so much; kidnaps, terror, a doomed marriage - and I never even told him what price we'd all have to pay at the end of it. I'll never stop feeling guilty for not being the one to tell him. He deserved to hear the words from my mouth, the one he was protecting and the one who enlisted his protection in the first place. Or maybe this has all given me a bolstered sense of self-importance. But I know for certain that since the moment he expressed that he didn't know what was due to happen, I wanted to tell him. As always, I was too nervous and too shy. Like a child, admitting to a wrong they'd done. Perhaps in a sense, it was exactly like that - we two were barely even adults back then, only just broken out of the black void of childhood than being an orphan left you, for neither of us had anyone to guide us. Maybe that was why we grew so close; we understood each other more than most in this world - Spira knows we both understood the pressure of living up to our father's legacies.

But no matter what we mutually understood or what attracted each to the other, he's gone; and I'm left behind. It was so numbing at first -the mantra of 'left behind' not really penetrating the numbness before it flamed into a spluttering light of anger. But it didn't last long - it was gone before the white-hot heat of anger properly hit me. And the sorrow sunk in. But I am still somewhat myself, I think. I was strong, for all the others. Just as I have always been. I was a survivor of Sin and that made me a hero of sorts. We all were, and we all had to be role models for others to look up to. Those of us that were left had to be. He was gone, free from all bonds of responsibility and pain and anger, and love and joy and happiness. I had to put on the mask of bravery. I had to smile like we'd once practised. I had to laugh but without the hollowness and shallowness of when we'd practised. But all I'm really left with are questions, memories, theories, and the vague aftertaste of emotions I can barely cling on to.

I have to live on for the others. I have to move on despite being left behind.

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	2. 094 Alcohol

_**Disclaimer: I don't own Final Fantasy X**_

 _Hello! I hope you're all enjoying it so far! Here's prompt 2._

 _ **Edit** : thanks to my kind reviewer, I've fixed the spelling mistakes here! Apologies for that - I'm an absolutely terrible proofreader..._ :|

 _Enjoy!_

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 _094\. Alcohol_

Yuna wiped her forehead with the back of her forearm, letting out a tired breath. Today was the day of one of the Bliztball Championship games at the stadium in Zanarkand, so the bar was heaving. Her shoes were all sticky with alcohol and even though she was wearing a summer outfit in the middle of winter, she was still burning behind the bar.

There seemed to be a never-ending wave of people coming over, swarms of excited and tipsy blitzball fans all singing team songs or shouting about how they thought the tactics would be played out. Honestly, Yuna didn't care about blitzball all that much. All she knew was that the Zanarkand Abes were mostly famous young kids, and that it looked amazing when the ball of water lit up like the brightest crystal she'd ever seen. One of her childhood friends was a bliztball player, and even though he wasn't high up nor full professional, she still thought he did an amazing, difficult job. To entertain so many people, she thought, must be a gift in life.

The wave of people carried on and Yuna dashed here there and everywhere around the bar - a beer, a cider, a vodka and lemonade; the list was endless. Yuna had been doing bar work for a year now in the evenings after college, but she didn't really drink alcohol herself all that much. Watching a lot of drunk people doing relentlessly stupid things was quite enough to put her off - and watching her cousin Rikku being sick at least seven times in one night, and then taking care of her had been a little off-putting.

The crowd finally thinned out, and most went to go and take their seats for the opening act. A band of some kind, usually. Yuna looked over at the bliztball dome as it began lighting up and Sally, her bar mate, went back to the kitchen to check a few things.

Yuna lent back against the back edge of the bar area, watching the lights and noise with a faint smile,

"Hey!" A voice called, jogging over to the bar. It was a blonde man, handsome, about her age, and smiling in a way that Yuna couldn't quite make out.

"Yes?" She responded, walking to the front edge of the bar. "What can I get for you?"

"Just a lemonade please." He watched as she nodded, and went to fill up a plastic cup for him. "We're going on soon but one of my teammates forgot to drink anything or buy a drink." He explained although Yuna hadn't a clue what he was going on about anyway. She walked over to him, holding the plastic cup and examining his face closely. Hadn't she seen him before? In the newspapers or wait, no, on the poster on her classmates' walls...?

"Oh!" She exclaimed, and he laughed.

"That unrecognisable outside of a TV?"

Yuna laughed nervously and shook her head. "No, sorry." She places the lemonade in front of him. "That's 12G please."

He nodded, counting out the change before placing it in her outstretched hand. "Say, what's your name?"

Yuna's eyebrows raised. "My name?"

"Yeah. Mine's Tidus."

"Yuna."

He smiled only on one side. "Well, Yuna, when're you next free?"

Her eyes widened, and she frowned, a bit suspicious that such a good-looking, famous young man would suddenly approach her with what she thought was a date. She liked film cliches and trashy romance plots as much as the next person - but wasn't this just a bit much? "Free? Free for what?"

Tidus shrugged. "Whatever you want."

Yuna didn't want to offend him but it did feel awfully suspicious. "Let's... go to the markets."

Tidus chuckled. "Markets it is."

"I'm free on Monday, after 4 - all day." She blurted quickly, to not let this chance go. He was just her type, after all. Besides, maybe there was a chance that he'd had his eye on her from afar for a while now, but was too shy to say anything. But maybe he was a serial killer - who knew?

"Where shall I pick you up?"

"The front of Zanarkand University. Just inside the gates, under the sycamore tree. I'll be waiting." She smiled, and like most people, he seemed to do a double take when he looked at her eyes. It was so common she didn't really notice it anymore - she only noticed now because she was so busy watching him.

"I'll see you then." He inclined his head slightly, took the lemonade and jogged off. Yuna watched him go with a slightly odd feeling. She was terrified and excited all at once. She just hoped he wasn't going to live up to the bliztballer reputation. She sighed, going back to her spot watching the performance. There wouldn't be people coming for drinks for ages, so she could stand there contently for a while with new butterflies in her stomach, feeling the sticky alcohol beneath her the soles of her shoes.

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 _Please review if you've got time and follow for more._ _Thanks!_


	3. 050 Eyes

**_Disclaimer: I don't own Final Fantasy X_**

 _Thank you to xEvilChick for your review! I'm glad you liked the last chapter and thank you so much for pointing out the typos! I kinda suck massively hard at proofreading..._

 _Enjoy!_

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 _050\. Eyes_

 _Green and Blue_

She has strange eyes, strange, but beautiful. I loved the blue; the ocean blue one. It was like the ocean, on going, stretching out forever, calm and still and tranquil, but with a dark and stormy and harsh side to it - a side I loved and found more... Sexy than anything else. She was more faceted than they believed, I saw in her what they never saw. I saw more in the depth of one of her eyes, than anyone had ever bothered to see.

Her eyes reminded me of home. Of the blue lights of Zanarkand, the home I missed and wished for as much as I wished for my father again, now. Of the blue water of the blitzball sphere that was always kept up, always spinning. But it reminded me of the water of my new home. Of the pitch water I first arrived in, and the tropical, turquoise water of my home; of Besaid. Her blue eye... It was grounding, amidst the turmoil and never-ending cycle of sin and death and sin and death. It was calm, amidst the never-ending hatred and worry that the all too short calms had brought, the anger that had surrounded their world - Spira for hundreds of years, thousands even. And they were peaceful; peaceful when I needed the calm in my all too new, all too hectic life.

I loved the other eye in the exact same way - the green eyes, grassy green.

It wasn't bright enough like Rikku's to be such a line green, but it wasn't as dark and blue or teal to be emerald, like my mother's. But somewhere in between, somewhere in the beautiful region that her eyes possessed, just blue enough to match her other eye, and just green enough to contrast in a way that caught my eye, every time.

This eye, it was like my new home, entirely. There was nothing of my old home in it, Zanarkand did not have any green in it - no green lights, no green material, nothing. It was everything Zanarkand wasn't. But everything Spira was. It was all the greenery in the sapphire oceans, all the greenery against the Mi'hen Highway and al the other beaten dirt-track roads Spira had to offer. All the green of the Calm Lands and all the green that surrounded my home. It was like a pulling down to reality, in the dream I was in. It was like a balance to all the excitement and joy I'd found in this new world, reminding me of all the truth of the world.

Together, I couldn't have asked for more. She claimed that she hated her eyes - the contrast, the striking look of them, and how they added so much 'unnecessary' mystery to her face - her words, not mine. But I loved them. They were beautiful, and together they were everything I'd once had, and everything I had now. Everything I needed and wanted, were in her eyes, I loved the mystery and the contrast and the striking look. I loved the blue and the green.

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 _I'm sorry! Just a really short one this week..._

 _Please review if you've got time and follow for more._ _Thanks!_


	4. 012 Guardian

**_Disclaimer: I don't own Final Fantasy X_**

 _Thank you everyone for reading until now, but unfortunately this is the end! Well, I'll update again one day, but I've gotta move on to other projects for now._

 _For the final time —_

 _Enjoy!_

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 _012\. Guardian_

I was supposed to be her guardian, but I knew less than she did. In this world, the swirling spiral of endless death that they named Spira, I was just the newest Dream of the bunch - and I would be their deadliest. I was the one that she loved, the one that was supposed to make her happy… Some guardian I was.

I was so clueless and naïve at first - even I started to believe that maybe I had just been influenced by Sin's toxin at one point. I wasn't fit to be anyone's guardian, I was almost out of my mind, crazy with the confusion I felt and the emotions I refused to feel. She deserved so much more than I was, especially at first.

In a way, she shielded me. I was completely ignorant of this world, of what a summoner's job really was. I'd said so many things that just couldn't happen, that could never be - we'd never all go back to the Moonflow together. Not even now that we know how to save her from Sin. I had wondered, for a while, if Sin had sent me now, at this time, to jolt me out of my old life and into the real world - to teach me a lesson. I thought I knew so much back then, I was practically king of the world - but here I knew nothing. I still know little. I still don't understand how they make that tin fly - it's nothing like the aircrafts I once knew.

But then again, I am a guardian of something now, something to do with her. There's a truth that she doesn't know, and I'm guarding it against her. Auron and I discussed what would happen when it was all over - if our plan worked out. I suspected that he had a hold tying him to this world beyond his own will to fulfil his promise, but I didn't say anything. It wasn't my place; not anymore. I think that he was hiding his own truth from someone too.

I saw as her face crumbled when I started to glow the ethereal colours of the pyreflies in the burning sky. She knew it would happen - they all knew it would happen - but none of them truly expected it. I didn't, not really. In that moment, I needed Auron to give me a stern nod of approval that I was doing the right thing, that guarding her against what I knew was a good thing to do. That she'd be happy, for the eventual discovery. I couldn't stand to look into her eyes though, as the tears gathered and began to fall like rosy fruits from a tree. I couldn't stand to listen anymore as, when I was just a shade standing on the fire-shaded dock, she said that she loved me. No one had ever said that to me before, and I felt humbled by her presence and ashamed of guarding her against the truth for the hundredth time over. I did love her, and I didn't have the corporeal form to say it any longer.

So I jumped.

And I waited.

I waited in the darkness, the lonely, cold darkness until I heard a voice. The same boyish voice that had started all of this so long ago. I think he asked me if I wanted to see her again, and I think I heard a woman's voice and whistling. I think he asked me if I wanted to go back, and I think that I replied in some form. I just remember the warmth and the comfort and nostalgia that went with it.

And I swam, up and up, following that shimmering, fuzzy, blue-tinged light as it grew brighter and brighter and like so long ago, I broke the surface of the warm water, looking out over the almost derelict beach of the warm, tropical island that I'd loved and grown on.

And there she was, just as beautiful as I remember, with a great deal more fire in her eyes. I knew then, as I always had done really, why I was her guardian. To guard her against the truths that damaged and batter her, and protect her from all harm, so that when the time came, I could make her smile again.

I looked over the beach and saw that three of my past companions had gathered there - Lulu and Wakka with a small ginger-haired baby, and Rikku, looking older, more tired, and a great deal happier upon seeing me. So he wasn't lying when he said that was the end for him.

I looked into Yuna's eyes, the bright eyes that I never wanted to see cry again, and nodded. I'd been her guardian, from all that would harm her. Now it was time to guard our friends from the very same pain. And this time, I was equipped to guard her - my niece in kind, from a life without a father.

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 _So uh... please read **Red Velvet and Swirled Eyes** if you're missing my writing (well that's bold of me lol) or just want my take on Aurriku...? Or if you've got a spare ten minutes...? I don't know - just please check it out if you're so inclined; I'm pretty proud of that one!_

 _Please review if you've got time, follow for future updates, and favourite if you enjoyed reading._ _Thank you and goodbye for now!_


	5. 008 Sound

**_Disclaimer: I don't own Final Fantasy X_**

 _I'm so hyyyppeeeddd for Christmas! I guess I'm still just a child inside._

 _Enjoy!_

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 _008\. Sound_

When Tidus was young, about maybe four or five years old, he had asked his mother over and over again, 'Does falling snow have a sound?' His mother, in a vain attempt, had tried to explain to him what snow was on a scientific level. His father had laughed at him when he came home, and Tidus had quickly forgotten all about the question.

That was, until they climbed up to the same, cold, isolated peaks of Mount Gagazet.

He sat in the midnight silence, alone. He wasn't really thinking about anything - he tried not to do that these days - but he listened. Listened for the voices that were going to tell him the answers, of the breath of inspiration. Or to what the sound of falling snow really was.

He didn't know how he could save Yuna yet. He didn't know how he was getting by day-to-day anymore. Even Rikku was downright miserable. And he had this strange feeling, unshakable, and heavy at the bottom of his gut. Like the whisper of a voice long forgotten, or the nagging feeling of a pressing thought now suddenly and inexplicably absent.

So he watched the snow fall. Hundreds of flakes falling in front of his face, thick on the awning above his head, but the only sound he could hear was on the howling, wild winds.

It was almost worse than silence; a tragedy of absence that only made the weights on his shoulders feel heavier and heavier.

And to think, Christmas was supposed to be the most magical time of the year.

"Tidus? What're you doing up so late?"

Yuna was almost as silent as the snow as she crept up on him. She sat down like a neat little cat, and he could feel the warmth she radiated through the thick layers of clothes.

"I was just watching the snow."

"And did you find anything."

He shook his head, wordlessly. "I wasn't thinking. I was— I was listening."

"Oh?"

The howling wind punctuated the pause.

"I was trying to see if falling snow makes a sound."

"Oh."

Her voice was soft, like a whisper carried on a breath that contained a thousand more words, like 'I get it', 'I know', 'I'll help' and 'its okay'.

She shivered and shuffled closer to him. He put an arm around her and, without any other sound than their breathing, they listened for the snow.

There, as midnight fell and Christmas Day began, Tidus sat with Yuna in the mouth of a cave and listened for the sound of falling snow.

He never did answer that question, not even as he faded back out of existence. Falling snow had no sound. It had no sound to science, nor the world. And Christmas that year didn't bring him the solution he would've liked. He didn't want to leave Yuna, he didn't want to die - even if he'd never been born in the first place. But he did get his answer to the question. To Tidus, it had a sound that beat in his ears as loud of the roaring of an enraged shoopuff: the two of them alone, and their breathing falling slowly into unison.

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